Tarbes - Jardin Massey

A ford made it easier to cross the Adour in ancient times, later the Romans settled in the area. A Christian church may have existed as early as the 4th century

Around 840 the Vikings led a devastating raid, but the town recovered and by the end of the 12th century the Count of Bigorre settled in his castle at Tarbes.

At the end of the Middle Ages, the city consisted of six separate fortified towns. During the Wars of Religion in 1569, Jeanne d'Albret's troops burned the cathedral, the convents, and other churches, as well as the bishopric. The inhabitants were massacred.
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The Jardin Massey is a large public garden built in the 19th century by Placide Massey horticulturist of the French King Louis Philippe I and the previous chief of the Palace of Versailles' gardens. The garden contains the cloister of the Saint-Sever-de-Rustan Abbey.

Some elements of the cloister were originally built in the 15th century for the Carmelite monastery of Trie-sur-Baïse which had been severely damaged during the Huguenot Wars. These parts of the cloister were sold to the Abbey of Saint-Sever-de-Rustan for the restoration of the cloister there, as there as well a band of Huguenots, under the command of the Earl of Montgomery, had settled in the abbey for months, plundered the treasury and destroyed the church.

The abbey got restored by the monks at the end of the 16th century and remodeled in the 18th century. It became state property in 1789 and was sold privately in 1792.

In 1890, when numerous capitals had already been sold (some of which can be seen today in The Cloisters Museum in New York City), the remaining parts were bought by the city of Tarbes and moved to Jardin Massey.

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